If you’ve shopped any of Bass Pro Shop’s superstores, you know the unique experience they offer. Part store, part amusement park in retail space stocked with anything and everything you could want in sporting goods. All set among dazzling displays celebrating hunting, fishing and the great outdoors.
The company has topped them all with the adventures awaiting shoppers of all ages in Bass Pro Shops at The Pyramid in Memphis. Hopefully, with this incarnation, the architectural landmark on the eastern shores of the Mississippi River will find the permanence and purpose it so richly deserves. Hats off to Memphis and the folks at Bass Pro Shops.
Step through the massive entrance at the base of the silver, gleaming pyramid and you’re first struck by the cypress trees towering from the sales floor. Then, as the eyes adjust, you start to take in the your surroundings. Two levels of an unparalleled selection of sports equipment and sportswear await discovery.
As you move from department to department you meander paths through cypress ponds stocked with giant catfish and gar, among others. There’s also a jumbo freshwater aquarium, alligator pool with live alligators, and faux cliffs teeming with bear, deer and mountain goat. Family members can dine and bowl in the store’s Uncle Buck’s Fishbowl on the ground floor, The lanes are set in an ocean-themed bowling alley, while an adjacent bar submerges shoppers in the remains of a sunken ship. For snackers there’s also a fudge/candy shop nearby.
Across the way, The Big Cypress Lodge, a hotel within this store, welcomes overnight guests. In keeping with the surroundings, they can choose from rustic rooms or treehouse cabins above the cypress swamp.
Then there’s the Sky High Ride. At the center of the expansive sales floor, America’s tallest freestanding elevator invites the adventurous to soar 28 stories up for breathtaking views of the Tennessee landscape, Memphis and the Mississippi River. Another restaurant here, The Lookout, offers an opportunity to dine or drink, immersed in these vistas.
Most will prefer to simply step outside to take in the scenery on the glass floored platforms set into the sides of the Pyramid, 300 feet in the air. The Sky High Ride costs $10 for adults, $5 for children before 4 pm, and is definitely worth it.
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| The Mississippi, looking north from The Pyramid . |
Whether you’re an avid outdoors lover, casual shopper, or parents with children, enjoyable adventures await all at Bass Pro Shops at The Pyramid. It’s a store, and so much more, and should be on the list of must-see attractions for every visitor to Memphis, from here forward.
